Outside the Olympic Museum in Lausanne is one of the most stunningly effective displays one could encounter. Past the majestic fountains, through the magnificent gardens, sidestepping the fascistic sculptures of muscular torsos that litter the lawns, one is confronted by a simple bar standing on top of two simple poles.

This, it transpires, is the high-jump apparatus set to the very height that Javier Sotomayor of Cuba cleared to win the gold medal in the Barcelona Olympics. And it is staggeringly high. Underneath it schoolchildren stand and crane their necks, looking upwards into the ether. A couple more essay a run up at it, in a vain attempt to imagine how anyone could throw themselves that high. Yet someone, last summer, unassisted by prop, machinery or Wile E Coyote-style springs in his heels, did just that. That bar is the most extraordinary record of achievement.

This is the irony of the Olympics: over the years, in order to facilitate something as simple yet wonderful as Sotomayor's leap, the most complex, politically charged and powerful bureaucracy in world sport has developed. It is a bureaucracy which, as well as delivering athletic records, has brought urban renewal, international prestige and shed loads of money on some of the countries that have hosted its events; a bureaucracy that has in its gift something which nations are prepared to grovel, bribe, lie and cheat their way towards securing.

And on a pillar behind Sotomayor's bar the names of the men in charge of that organisation have been carved. In 105 years of the existence of the modern Olympic movement only eight have held sway. The latest, the Belgian Dr Jacques Rogge, took up office last summer, three days after it was announced that the next beneficiary of hosting the Olympics, a largesse that was worth more than $5billion to the Australian economy last year, was to be China.

Dr Rogge can be found about two miles down the road from the Olympic Museum, a distance Haile Gebrselassie, for instance, could cover in about a third of the time it takes me to drive there. If a man's power can be gauged by the cars waiting outside his offices, then Dr Rogge is very powerful indeed. As we arrive a fleet of chauffeur-driven Mercedes is whisking away his previous visitors; as we leave, two sleekly attired young secretaries emerge from an ante-room carrying his coat and bag, while a third briefs him on his next appointment.

If he does wield more influence than many a head of state, however, Dr Rogge has yet to exhibit any airs and graces. His greeting is effusive, his handshake firm, his eye contact direct and unwavering.

But then, that is why he was elected. He was seen, in many quarters, as a diplomatic, modernising antidote to his predecessor Juan Antonio Samaranch, the autocratic Spaniard who ruled the Olympic roost for 21 years. Alongside a picture of its jovial, smiling new president, the IOC's own in-house publication ran this headline to announce his appointment: "Dr Jacques Rogge: operation de charme". Which makes you wonder, why does the new man thinks the IOC needs a charm offensive?

"I am responsible for many things, but not what a journalist is writing," he says, in flawless English, a couple of moments after conducting his previous meeting in German and addressing one of his secretaries in Spanish. "No, what the IOC needs is continuity, stability and the possibility of building on the huge success of the last 20 years."

His predecessor might have been around long enough to see off two British prime ministers, four American presidents and sufficient Italian heads of state to field a football team but Rogge's reign has been limited to 12 years so new ideas can circulate. But even in the newly reduced period of presiding he will pack in more than most people do in a lifetime. He squeezes the Guardian between meeting Sepp Blatter, president of football's governing body Fifa, issuing a plea for a ceasefire in Afghanistan during the winter Olympics in February and attending the world judo championships. Ever the diplomat, he gives the impression that the meeting with us is as important to him as the others. And this despite our not bringing any sort of gift or bribe of the kind apparently used to secure the Salt Lake City games, the first over which he will preside.

"There is no doubt there were problems," he says of the unconventional manner in which those games were awarded, involving the procurement of anything from wristwatches to hookers for those on the voting panel. "But the IOC responded and the procedures to ensure that there could be no repetition of the Salt Lake City situation were in place before I began my presidency."

Can he be sure they will work? "We are dealing with human beings, and human weakness has been with us since before the Olympics," he says. "I don't think even the president of the IOC has it within his power to eliminate human weakness. But I do believe the rules have been strengthened and tightened sufficiently, yes."

But if the Olympic credibility was not fatally damaged by Salt Lake, wasn't it given an almighty bruising by its awarding of the 2008 competition to China, whose regime has one of the worst human rights records in the world? Since Fifa has just asked the World Cup co- hosts South Korea to ban the locals from eating dogs, might it not be a good idea if the IOC suggested China might stop persecuting some of its human population? "It is not the job of the IOC to interfere with the internal workings of any of its members' political systems," he says.

It tried to with South Africa in the 70s and 80s. "We saw a way in which we could play a part in bringing about a change which the world thought was necessary. And I think history would suggest that we in sport played a very important part in that change. On the issue of China and human rights, we have made our position to them absolutely clear."

Has there been any response from them? "As yet, no. In time we hope so."

In his youth Rogge played open-side flanker in the Belgian national rugby team - "This is no great achievement, they ring to see if you are available, then you are in the team." Yet his ability to deal with incoming flak on subjects varying from China to doping control to Britain's chances of ever hosting the games after its pitiful failure over the 2005 World Athletics Championships suggests he was wasted in the pack: he should have used his sidestep at fly-half. He was also a champion sailor, competing in three Olympics. Which begs an important question of the world's leading sporting bureaucrat: is administration in any way comparable to competing?

"Of course not, no. In many ways I died when I was 35 and retired from competition. I love this job but nothing compares to playing sport. I would do anything to be young again and competing. That is what the Olympics is about."

It is about, in short, Javier Sotomayor and his vertiginous bar, rather than Jacques Rogge and his bevy of secretaries. It is early days but, given his predecessor's delusions of grandeur, it is somehow reassuring to know the new man at the top appreciates that fundamental.

Jacques Rogge on...

Britain's chances of ever hosting a games

"Of course the Picketts Lock situation was a very serious one. A country not being able to fulfil its pledge to host a major competition is not a trivial matter. But that does not mean Britain will never again be able to host a games. Remember this, we rejected the proposal from Athens that it should host the 1996 games, because we felt their bid was not good enough. Eight years later we accepted their bid for the 2004 games. So a country is not finished completely if it makes one failure. If Britain makes another bid, it will be assessed on its merits like every other bid. Your country is a very rich, sophisticated country: if the will is there, there is no reason it should not propose a successful bid. But the will must be there."

Paula Radcliffe and her protest against drug users at the Edmonton World Athletic Championships:

"Paula Radcliffe is a very fine young woman, a very brave young woman and of course a very fine athlete. I had the opportunity to meet with her in Bruges recently and I was very impressed with her and what she did. And she is right. Any battle against cheating can be won only if the athletes themselves do something about it. It is not the administrators who take the drugs. It is not the members of the IOC committee who are doing the cheating. It is the athletes. We can play our part only in the way of testing and ensuring the tests are fair. But it is up to the athletes to play their part too."

Preparations for Athens 2004:

"Athens is on course to produce a very good Olympic Games. Whether it will be as good as the last one, of course we will not know until it happens. Where we have been worried about the timetable not being met we have made our feelings known and the Greek committee is working very, very hard to bring the preparations back on timetable. We are now confident that it will be a success."